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Big Trouble for the Emperor of Little Saigon

The Emperor I refer to is of course, the current reigning Assemblyman from the 68th Assembly District Van Tran.

Radio, in particular talk radio, is big in the Vietnamese-American community. The airwaves over Little Saigon are some of the most politically charged in the country. Sean Hannity, Bill O’Riley, Rush Limbaugh, and Air America have nothing on this plethera of self-producing radio hosts from Orange County.

Back during the June primary election for First District Supervisor the skys were all aflame with charges of communist sympathies on the part of candidates Janet Nguyen, and Dina Nguyen. Chief among the lobbers of the red paint was Assemblyman Van Tran, who supported Dina Nguyen over Janet Nguyen because Janet defeated Tran’s protege Trung Nguyen in the February 2007 Special Election in the First District. Seems that Janet Nguyen had a falling out with Van Tran a few years ago when Janet would not vote the way Tran wanted her to on an issue before the Garden Grove City Council when she was a member.

In this never ending saga of insults, Van Tran has come off as a sore loser. I would even go so far as to say he’s acting like a spoiled brat. Anyway, that’s a different topic. For November, the battle continues with Trung Nguyen running against Andrew Do, Janet Nguyen’s Chief of Staff. You also have Troung Diep, currently a member of the Midway City Sanitary District Board, and a lead staffer from Tran’s Assembly District office.

Radio host Do Son has a broadcast on the Vietnamese language radio station VNCR. He pays for his airtime and speaks his mind. Mr. Son has been an outspoken critic of Van Tran and his allies, including Troung Diep, Trung Nguyen, and Dina Nguyen to name a few. Well, Van Tran and his friends do not really appreciate the opinions of Mr. Son. In fact, it seems they will stop at nothing to try to silence him.

After failing in an attempt to “convince” Do Son to go away willingly, Tran and his allies have engaged in a relentless campaign to intimidate the owners of In-Language Radio (106.3 FM) into taking Mr. Son off the air.

Tran, through his attorney Bart KasperowiczÂ on October 10, 2008Â sent a Cease and Desist letter demanding that “Mr. Do Son immediately cease and desist from making any further defamatory statements related to 68th District California State Assemblyman Van Tran.” The letter went on to warn; “As the owner/operator of 106.3 FM, we ask that you communicate our request to Mr. Son in person in order to prevent further harm from his conduct as well as to ensure that your station has ‘…exercised due care to prevent the publication or utterance of such statements or matters in such broadcast’ Cal Civ. Code 48.5(1). The letter also asked that the station only communicate the content of the letter personally to Mr. Son. I can only suppose that they didn’t want the letter distributed publicly.

Van Tran has been a political figure for long enough that he should know that as an elected (public) official, he cannot sue Mr. Son or the radio broadcaster that sold him airtime over Mr. Son’s statements no matter how inflammatory because public officials are specifically excluded. Apparently, Assemblyman Tran, really doesn’t care about free speech, rather, he prefers the principles of suppression of free speech practiced by the communist regime of Vietnam.

In fact, his staffer Mr. Troung Diep appears to hold the same perspective as well. On October 15, 2008 Diep sent an email complaint to the station saying; “We live in a free society, but that should not permit the radio station to go on the air and spill nothing but slanderous rhetoric against people in public office.”

Do Son decided to hold a press event/rally today at 2 PM in Little Saigon. He’s not taking the harassment and thuggish tactics of Tran, his allies or his attorneys. The assembled crowd of about 200 people wasn’t having any of it either.

Kieu Loan Nguyen of Westminster put it this way; “I want the Vietnamese community to have the opportunity to hear different points of view and be informed.” Nguyen added, “I have nothing against Mr. Tran Thai Van, but I don’t want the same government I left Vietnam to get away from.”

Note: Wah, Wah, Wah! Are these boys really tough enough to serve in elective office? Has Troung Diep ever watched public comment at a City Council meeting?Â Come on boys, grow a set.

I was there. I’ve never saw such a thing. People were chanting “Down with Van Tran” and they also raised the issue of Recalling Van Tran. They talked about Madison Nguyen from San Jose. She betrayed the community one time and is now facing a recall. Van Tran has betrayed the community many times so it is about time we recall him.

The threaten letters from mobsterboss Van and his group was passed around. You should post that up for everyone to see.

Van Tran’s gangs will be taken down by all of us. I will vote for the Democract Ken Arnold over Van to make a statement that he is no longer our choice. Van will lose thousands of Vietnamese American votes in this election to show our protest against this type of intimation and personal agenda against us.

The Republican Party better open their eyes soon and jump off the ship before they go down on the sinking ship. Lets see if they’ve learned their lessons with Mike Carona or not.

NO to gangs

October 26, 2008 at 9:03 am

Let’s not forget to take out all Van’s cronies too. What Van’s example has done is create a “gang” mentality amongst his follower’s. Van and his bungling gang have effectively opened the door for Janet and her smaller gang to emerge. Sounds like the “bloods” vs. the “crips”. All this is doing is creating a prejudice that was not there before. I personally felt a warm feeling when Van was first elected. I always love an underdog success story. Now that the Vietnamese have rightfully achieved some political power, is’nt it time to have a little quality control. Sad it is when power goes to someones head. It happens in large corporations all the time. Van was elected to do a job. How much is this power lust taking from his ability to do his job. Even if his motives are proven to be kind of sincere, does that excuse unethical ganglike means of attaining them. (consequently warping all his followers into the same mentality)

Great story, Chris. Might I remind your reader that this isn’t the first time Tran has tried to pull this censorious bullshit. Back in 2004, Tran pulled the same crap on another Vietnamese-language radio host.

This is really pissing me off. I urge everyone to flood Tran’s email with complaints about his Boss Tweed dealings. Expect a post from me tomorrow where I’ll go more into detail about what he did in the past.

When I ran against Boss Tran back in 2000 for City Council I remeber a poster he had plastered all over Little Saigon. It was a shot of him sitting in at the Council dias in that high back chair. The picture made him look like an emperor sitting on a throne. Since then I have tought of his the Emperor of Little Saigon.

That said, you’re right, Van Tran is little more than a small town thug.

Isn’t the only issue we can all identify Van with is his fight against Communist? It is sad to see him using the same tactics against the Vietnmanese language radios in AMERICA like the communist are doing in Vietnam to shut down the people’s right when they speak out against the government.

I hear Van Tran is really pissed because he can’t extort monies from these people anymore and shut up the media so the voter don’t know what is really going on. This is great because the party leaders of the republicans are finally starting to see what the true Rift is between Van Tran “Boss Man Tweed” and Janet Nguyen is….

Great post Chris. I would also note that the Trannies attempted to have a McCain rally this past weekend in Little Saigon, presumably in response to the successful pro Obama rally last week. Despite getting publicity in the LA Times and Red County, the event drew a meagre few dozen plus old guys. Sad comparison to the over 100, mostly young, highly energized Vietnamese who came out for Obama. (Also know that there was a Obama rally in San Jose this past weekend as well) This is bad news for Van, the co-chair of California for McCain effort if he can no longer mobilize his base.

Another issue to watch is the Westminster School Distrct Bond vote. Trustee Andrew Nguyen is all over the Vietnamese radio supporting this and one wonders that should it pass, where the contracts will go since Andrew has become cozy friends with the Trannies. He and fellow Dem. Mary Mangold, the board chair, have endorsed hard core Van worshiper Trung Diep aka Tomahawk (Red County) for city council. There is little doubt that he will work closely wth Andy Quach and Tri Ta in furthering the reach of Van. It’s beginning to smell a little like fishsauce.

Van Tran has just killed any chance of ever going to congrees. Gustavo thanks for pointing out the old attempt of Van to silence the media. It\’s good to point out that Van paid Do Son 20K for radio time when he first ran for Assembly.

Teresa of OC

October 31, 2008 at 7:34 pm

Why are you all complaining about Van Tran being the Godfather and his gang activities? You’re the ones who kept on confirming his status as Godfather & him running a gang. If you look back at each of your comments, you will see that you, yourselves, confirmed this so called “gang” & want to believe this. If you get such a kick out creating political battles, then you might want to make a big deal out of the activities that Scott Baugh or Frank Barbaro’s political gangs are doing behind the scene. Van and Jane are small time cockroaches. Jane has got her own gang of business opportunists as well, if you all don’t already know (Andrew Do-a business partner & an employee of Jane, an attack dog for Jane in the Vietnamese Media; Tony Lam, former city council member of Westminster who has gotten Jane tons and tons of $; Nick LeCong, allegedly the force behind the gossips on Jane’s opponents in exchange for a position in the county; A Tu Nguyen & Nhi Xuan Van Ho, the link between businessmen from VN and the Jane’s gang; Viet Weekly, a newspaper that has broken practically all rules of ethics when it comes to Jane’s opponents). Recently, there has been a shift of power in Jane’s gang from A Tu Nguyen & Nhi Xuan Van Ho to Andrew Do perhaps due to the fact that he’s in the United States more than the other two.) Anyway, that’s Jane 101 for you. Why do these two deserve any discussions? Don’t you people get it yet? No matter what they do, it’s wrong. If Van eats, he’s corrupt; and what ever Jane does in the bathroom is a misrepresentation. There are people out there that will go to any extent to create publicity for these two even if it lacks any newsworthy value like Mr. Prevatt. I am so tired of continuous news that aren’t news. Mr. Prevatt wonders why some people have passed on this “news”? Please, take us back to the mainstream. Help Little Saigon go mainstream, where ethic is a concern and campaigns are ran on “real” issues. Just to be clear, I am neither for Van for Jane. I believe that Little Saigon media needs help and it can be helped by the mainstream media, Mr. Prevatt.